William Stevenson Bateman

Nirfa Diaz doesn’t usually get called to come into her Nirfa’s Beauty Salon at 1 a.m. June 16, however, was not a normal morning.

After receiving a call that her salon, located on S.R. 56, had been entered, she drove to the shop to find several Pasco County Sheriff’s Office (PCSO) deputies already at the scene.

According to the PCSO report, Tampa resident and barber William Stevenson Bateman, 59, of 4720 El Dorado Dr., broke into Nirfa’s Salon around 12:30 a.m. on June 16, using a hammer to break the glass front door. Once inside, he stole a cash box containing an undisclosed amount of money.

He also had already broken into Planet Beach, the business located directly next to Nirfa’s, stole a computer valued at $1,500 and fled the scene in his blue Dodge minivan. PCSO deputies pursued the vehicle and arrested Bateman, who was charged with two counts each of unarmed burglary of an occupied conveyance, grand theft and possession of burglary tools after deputies confirmed the crimes that had been caught on Nirfa’s security camera.

Roger Wolf, the owner of the adjacent Wolf’s Den restaurant in the same plaza, said the PCSO deputies, including a helicopter unit and several PCSO cruisers, were still at the scene looking for Bateman when the restaurateur arrived to do his breakfast prep work sometime after 3 a.m.

“How unlucky was he (Bateman) that a deputy was circling around the plaza at that moment with his window rolled down and heard the glass breaking?,” said Wolf.